Retconning

[Gaspard]

You're taking to specific examples now. But I'll try to elaborate each;

 

In regards to the Relationship example; If you have two players, from which one drops off the radar, and they have a relationship going, you don't have to Retcon anything. The player is gone, therefore you can have your character simply say 'I've not seen him since (insert time here).' Take it Icly. The Character vanished, therefore the love has been abandoned, therefore the other character can continue playing from the relationship having ended up broken because the other character suddenly dissappeared over night. Keeps everyones story going with no Retcon involved.

 

As for the leveling to 50, changing names bit;

 

Those are game mechanics. Askier has done a wonderful example of how you can switch things up, and moreso how your ingame presentation =/= your character. Your overhead name can be 'James Castiel', and  you can still be playing 'Victor Harness', by switching up the appearance.

 

Also, it is 'not' obnoxious to want people to play by the same rules. What is obnoxious is assuming everyone has to take heed and care to your personal 'feelings', because you don't 'like your character anymore'.

 

You restarting your character in order to have a better experience affects exactly one person. Yourself. You're dealing with your own problem.

 

Retconning because you don't want to re-level/use the same base model/don't want to use fantasia creates a problem for various people, case in point 'everyone' who's played with you so far. That is the definition of Egoism. Before I have to deal with my problem, I'd rather just ignore it/retcon it and make it a problem for everyone else.

 

This has nothing to do with being inconsiderate towards other players. Infact, being against Retcon means the opposite. You care for the roleplay you do, and others have, and would rather sacrifice your own character then to disrupt the RP environment/flow/story-telling because you right now 'just don't feel your character'.

 

The only instance in which Retcon should be, in any way justified is if the roleplay was based on faulty information to begin with, or any godmodding/metagaming/ other RP breaking things have been done.

 

 

So to make it short:

 

Making a new character makes it a problem for 'one' person: You. You feel your chars not up to par, you make a new one.

 

Retconning makes it a problem for far more people. Because you don't want to go through the work, everyone elses story has to suffer.

 

 

 

Also, I think it's important to define Retcon again. Retcon is about ignoring/changing aspects of your character/the story. It is not having your character move on from a broken storyline that's not going anywhere.

[Warren Castille]

Just for the sake of everyone, Warren should just share his secrets!

 

You meet a fairly important Sultansworn NPC who is incognito in the Ul'dah opening. The paladin questline has you operating in the field as a Free Paladin, and you run into more Sworn on duty in the stages of it too.

 

They're not locked into the palace, and the game shows this pretty readily.

[Aldotsk]

You're taking to specific examples now. But I'll try to elaborate each;

 

In regards to the Relationship example; If you have two players, from which one drops off the radar, and they have a relationship going, you don't have to Retcon anything. The player is gone, therefore you can have your character simply say 'I've not seen him since (insert time here).' Take it Icly. The Character vanished, therefore the love has been abandoned, therefore the other character can continue playing from the relationship having ended up broken because the other character suddenly dissappeared over night. Keeps everyones story going with no Retcon involved.

 

So to make it short:

 

Making a new character makes it a problem for 'one' person: You. You feel your chars not up to par, you make a new one.

 

Retconning makes it a problem for far more people. Because you don't want to go through the work, everyone elses story has to suffer.

 

 

Also, I think it's important to define Retcon again. Retcon is about ignoring/changing aspects of your character/the story. It is not having your character move on from a broken storyline that's not going anywhere.

 

No, you -don't- have to say that the opposite character "has not been here for a while" if you choose not to have the character in your plot due to a lot of problems. It doesn't have to keep any story going. It doesn't end other side of plots or affect it. A player and the character can be forgotten as if never happened. This is an open RPG game, and lot of things can happen to just start or end a story. 

 

I really think your opinions and my opinions in Retcon are completely different because I personally do not want to see it that way. If someone told me that they want to retcon something, I'll just respect their wishes and discuss of why that person want to do it. 

 

If you think that everyone else has to suffer, then you are probably thinking it wrong. Because the player's character does not have to have that much impact in your character's plot. You can adjust at anytime. You didn't copyright anything or made a print on anything to be 100% confirmed. It's rather stupid to say that the player's character's mistakes to be 100% blamed for player's actions. It CAN be retconned.

 

Since when was there a rule about roleplayers changing whatever is given to them? If you really have a problem with someone retconning a story when it was established with you, then you can either cooperate or just sever ties with them because -you- don't like it.

[Warren Castille]

Think of it like this: Character A and Character B are a couple. You didn't much care for Character B but you and Character A went on an adventure to save Character B when they got kidnapped by beastmen. The adventure built trust and you saved each other's lives, and Character B considers you a friend now.

 

A week later, Character B quits. How do you retcon out someone who was a large portion of the impetus of you relationship? What if Character A quits? How do you rationalize your history with Character B?

[Aldotsk]

If your character is in the middle of progression story and suddenly the other player decided to call quit in the middle progression, the part of that plot because dead as a doornail. It doesn't matter how friendly and how memorable the relations between two characters were. If the plot gets halt in the middle, you can't just leave it as open plot for the rest of that character's life. It's unfair and it's also probably not what you personally wanted from the start. Which is why retconning can be a very good essential thing to players to help them to alter the plans or alter story if they have to.

[Gaspard]

and whu exactly cant you leave it open? Also, you didnt truly answer warrens question. If my character befriends another character based on the relatipnship with character c, yet character c is retconned, then my friendship with that character.

 

or in other words. Roleplaying is like building a house of cards. Each stacks ontop of another and just shifting the lower cards makes it all collapse.

[Aya]

I don't really understand why relationships with someone who quits require any sort of retcon... I mean relationships are wildly mutable things.  I would have thought that in cases where it were possible to easily explain something in story, that would be the preferred approach.  Character B quite the game? Alright.. then the relationship didn't work out, and there are a myriad of reasons why. 

 

Retconning is the preserve of stories that are no longer plausible for whatever reason.  If your character did A in their past, only for the player to discover that A was entirely impossible due to the game's lore (perhaps newly learned), then it may be possible to make a minor adjustment to the character by removing A from his past, or changing it in some way to make it plausible.

 

Just because something is inconvenient doens't mean that it should be written out, especially if it impacts other people's stories or interactions in some way.  Better I would think, at that point, to consider writing a whole new character, rather than asking people to ignore an entire history of in-character interactions together.

[Verranicus]

My character will call out anyone claiming to be from a "far off land" who can't go into explicit detail about their homeland because it may or may not exist just because they couldn't fit their character into the confines of the established lore.

 

Even  though it already gives plenty of hint in future patch and events that far east exists? People experiment and work out their character everyday to make something new into the story. Snowflake or not, not everyone plays an empty character - especially when  it's still vague enough for each race by their certain tribe and racial behaviors.

 

So I mean, would you be this kind of person and challenge their character like this because it confines established lore? "Why are you a Sworn and in a duty when you are not next to Sultana protecting her? That's questioning the lore"

 

Or even "How are you able to use  muskets when the lore clearly closed the musketeer guild?"

 

A good RPer should be able to work within "the norm" for whatever world they're in without needing to use gray areas that could potentially end up making their characters non-canon

 

There are plenty of good writers and good RPers who always edit and work on their characters all the time. Good artists and good writers will -never- say their works are masterpiece and it is done. They adjust and work on it more or rebrush it to improve it. What you are saying is just completely difficult for anyone to  do something new and challenge for once. 

 

We aren't all conformists. Some end up being a rebel or some end up being  something  different. It's human nature. In -lore- we may not  be all same human/homo sapiens, but they surely behave and think the same like regular humans in the real world do. They just can't create cellphone yet.

 

 

So even if it's possible, don't try to be a special snowflake and do it anyway

 

That's not gonna happen because some of us like something different from everyone else.

 

I always find it funny when people run away with stuff the game gives little to no information on with their characters and then either have to backpedal to the point of losing weeks/months of RP or keep RPing a then non-canon thing despite it.

 

I'm waiting for more information on Othard/Doma/the Far East to come out down the road to show how silly it is for all of these people with japanese-y names to be running around claiming to be from there.

 

And yet there are plenty of hints and plenty of cultural explanations of Doma/Far east from the NPCs. So who are you to say that it  doesn't exist because lore didn't explain it 100%? There is less information about Ala Mhigans fully 100% and that applies to Duskwights or any type of races besides what is given to us. 

 

Not all Japanese-y names are from Doma and they RP with others. Are you going to criticize them for that too?

 

EDIT:

I'd like to add that FFXI had vague lore for samurais and ninjas because they are also from far east but  the lores  were sliced off and people RPed making their own plots back then. It still hasnt been explained fully.

 

"Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn't really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That's because they were able to connect experiences they've had and synthesize new things." -Steve Jobs

 

 

"Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way" - Edward de Bono

 

 

There is not enough lore on the Far East or Doma to base a character around yet. People are just using it's existence as an excuse to roleplay their anime wannabe characters with impetus.

 

It's not about being a rebel or fighting the system, it's about taking the world your character exists in and making your story realistic. If you need some fancy backstory just to stand out, you're probably lacking in actual RP skills or you need to find better people to RP with.

[Aya]

If your character is in the middle of progression story and suddenly the other player decided to call quit in the middle progression, the part of that plot because dead as a doornail. It doesn't matter how friendly and how memorable the relations between two characters were. If the plot gets halt in the middle, you can't just leave it as open plot for the rest of that character's life. It's unfair and it's also probably not what you personally wanted from the start. Which is why retconning can be a very good essential thing to players to help them to alter the plans or alter story if they have to.

Why not?  Why can't such a relationship, no matter how dedicated it may have seemed at one point, end because it no longer suits the characters?  That is what relationships do, they can be highly volatile and unpredictable things.  It should not be challenging to write a plausible story to extricate a character from such a dead-end "progression story" if that happens, and that seems vastly more appropriate (especially if interactions with other characters have been involved) than trying to write the whole episode out of existence, which leads to all sorts of issues with continuity. 

 

I understand retconning out something that has become implausible, casting the entire story of a character in doubt.  I can't, however, get behind trying to sweep something under the rug because its inconvenient (unless, perhaps, its a really minor detail that doesn't impact others). 

 

I mean, I guess, in a sense, your character's story is your own to control.  But you cannot expect unlimited patience by others when it comes to trying to get them to accept that past events did not occur, or occurred differently.  That is a two-way street, and one that should not be handled by fiat.

[Aldotsk]

I just said, it is PLAYER's wish to whether they want to stick with it or change the plot completely if it discomforts them. Why bother pushing a player into keep or doing something that they are not okay with it? Just because -you- like it?

 

What Warren said is agreeable that you -can- make a decision whether you want to keep that plot memory in your character's background or just completely erase it from the boards because you feel that it is not helping you to progress further part of the plot because you wanted something bigger for the future with that Player B.

 

If someone stabbed my character by accident and he's in jail because of his mistake and then he PMs me that he wants to retcon because he made a mistake - I won't hold it against him and agree to cooperate. I retcon sometimes if I have to, and me retconning the whole Garlean story for my alt and etc has to be altered now since it is confirmed that Garleans who are pure blood have no abilities to use aether magic.

 

Let the cards collapse and make it into a newer deck and reshape the cards into a house again. Never said the house of cards had to remain as it stands.

[Verranicus]

I just said, it is PLAYER's wish to whether they want to stick with it or change the plot completely if it discomforts them. Why bother pushing a player into keep or doing something that they are not okay with it? Just because -you- like it?

 

What Warren said is agreeable that you -can- make a decision whether you want to keep that plot memory in your character's background or just completely erase it from the boards because you feel that it is not helping you to progress further part of the plot because you wanted something bigger for the future with that Player B.

 

If someone stabbed my character by accident and he's in jail because of his mistake and then he PMs me that he wants to retcon because he made a mistake - I won't hold it against him and agree to cooperate. I retcon sometimes if I have to, and me retconning the whole Garlean story for my alt and etc has to be altered now since it is confirmed that Garleans who are pure blood have no abilities to use aether magic.

 

Let the cards collapse and make it into a newer deck and reshape the cards into a house again. Never said the house of cards had to remain as it stands.

 

You should be using these events, good or bad, to shape your character. You can't just erase what you don't like.

[Aldotsk]

There is not enough lore on the Far East or Doma to base a character around yet. People are just using it's existence as an excuse to roleplay their anime wannabe characters with impetus.

 

It's not about being a rebel or fighting the system, it's about taking the world your character exists in and making your story realistic. If you need some fancy backstory just to stand out, you're probably lacking in actual RP skills or you need to find better people to RP with.

 

How is playing Japanese style of character "anime wannabe character"? You are just now stereotyping that all Asian type of characters are considered as anime wannabe characters. There are plenty of Eorzean characters that players make are like anime style, and they'd be considered anime-wannabe characters. You who has played Anime style video games should understand the concept that NOT all Asian oriented characters should be stereotyped to be anime characters.

 

This game is Final -Fantasy- which means it's not 100% realistic. It's got fantasy fictional unnatural things that happen in this game, and it cannot be viewed as some Medieval content of view back in 1400-1500s since there were no such thing as Magitek vehicles or giant Bahamut blowing continents away. 

 

Also lacking in Actual RP skills? Who are you to judge that people have good RP skills or not? That's just elitism and narrow minded in your words. I would suggest you to recollect and be careful with what you say in words.

[Aya]

If its something minor and all involved parties agree, I can't really object.  I'm usually someone willing to offer, or suggest it, in cases where the ramifications to a character may be vastly greater than the player likely expected (see the recent discussion regarding Natalie's death).

 

What I don't like is the idea that large amounts of past interaction can be wiped off the table because their context is now inconvenient or annoying (for example, because you're trying to extricate yourself from a relationship with someone who's quit the game, and don't want to bother writing out an end to it).  That to me just really doesn't sit right.

[Aldotsk]

I just said, it is PLAYER's wish to whether they want to stick with it or change the plot completely if it discomforts them. Why bother pushing a player into keep or doing something that they are not okay with it? Just because -you- like it?

 

What Warren said is agreeable that you -can- make a decision whether you want to keep that plot memory in your character's background or just completely erase it from the boards because you feel that it is not helping you to progress further part of the plot because you wanted something bigger for the future with that Player B.

 

If someone stabbed my character by accident and he's in jail because of his mistake and then he PMs me that he wants to retcon because he made a mistake - I won't hold it against him and agree to cooperate. I retcon sometimes if I have to, and me retconning the whole Garlean story for my alt and etc has to be altered now since it is confirmed that Garleans who are pure blood have no abilities to use aether magic.

 

Let the cards collapse and make it into a newer deck and reshape the cards into a house again. Never said the house of cards had to remain as it stands.

 

You should be using these events, good or bad, to shape your character. You can't just erase what you don't like.

 

There are TIMES when a person needs to erase it when it's necessary. It's not your decision to say what they can do and what they cannot do. You aren't the developer of the game nor the game master of the game. You can freely ignore players or myself if -you- think your roleplaying style doesn't match with other players. 

 

What you are saying is "Oh you made a mistake and you are ruining your character and your player skills. What you've done is permanent. I will not consider you to fix anything because you already made a mistake in-character."

[Warren Castille]

Everyone chill. There's no right or wrong here and we can discuss the differences without needing to tear one another down. Forums are also like card houses, and only Godzilla and mods get to erase people and... Well, this one got away from me. /backseatmodmode

 

The issue with allowing minor retcons all the time (if needed) is that it can completely eliminate continuity. If I make Warren snap and just start smiting the Quicksand one night and then log in the next day saying "Sorry, had a lot to drink, undo last night" I'm now impacting the RP of a LOT of people! Bystanders, people who responded, people who've never met me. We share a world, and when things happen in public it's unreasonable, in my opinion, to expect everyone to just let you rewind time to bear no consequences or see how something turns out another way instead.

 

No save states in my RP, please.

[Verranicus]

I just said, it is PLAYER's wish to whether they want to stick with it or change the plot completely if it discomforts them. Why bother pushing a player into keep or doing something that they are not okay with it? Just because -you- like it?

 

What Warren said is agreeable that you -can- make a decision whether you want to keep that plot memory in your character's background or just completely erase it from the boards because you feel that it is not helping you to progress further part of the plot because you wanted something bigger for the future with that Player B.

 

If someone stabbed my character by accident and he's in jail because of his mistake and then he PMs me that he wants to retcon because he made a mistake - I won't hold it against him and agree to cooperate. I retcon sometimes if I have to, and me retconning the whole Garlean story for my alt and etc has to be altered now since it is confirmed that Garleans who are pure blood have no abilities to use aether magic.

 

Let the cards collapse and make it into a newer deck and reshape the cards into a house again. Never said the house of cards had to remain as it stands.

 

You should be using these events, good or bad, to shape your character. You can't just erase what you don't like.

 

There are TIMES when a person needs to erase it when it's necessary. It's not your decision to say what they can do and what they cannot do. You aren't the developer of the game nor the game master of the game. You can freely ignore players or myself if -you- think your roleplaying style doesn't match with other players. 

 

What you are saying is "Oh you made a mistake and you are ruining your character and your player skills. What you've done is permanent. I will not consider you to fix anything because you already made a mistake in-character."

 

What's the point of RPing if there's no continuity or consequences for your actions?

[Aldotsk]

I just said, it is PLAYER's wish to whether they want to stick with it or change the plot completely if it discomforts them. Why bother pushing a player into keep or doing something that they are not okay with it? Just because -you- like it?

 

What Warren said is agreeable that you -can- make a decision whether you want to keep that plot memory in your character's background or just completely erase it from the boards because you feel that it is not helping you to progress further part of the plot because you wanted something bigger for the future with that Player B.

 

If someone stabbed my character by accident and he's in jail because of his mistake and then he PMs me that he wants to retcon because he made a mistake - I won't hold it against him and agree to cooperate. I retcon sometimes if I have to, and me retconning the whole Garlean story for my alt and etc has to be altered now since it is confirmed that Garleans who are pure blood have no abilities to use aether magic.

 

Let the cards collapse and make it into a newer deck and reshape the cards into a house again. Never said the house of cards had to remain as it stands.

 

You should be using these events, good or bad, to shape your character. You can't just erase what you don't like.

 

There are TIMES when a person needs to erase it when it's necessary. It's not your decision to say what they can do and what they cannot do. You aren't the developer of the game nor the game master of the game. You can freely ignore players or myself if -you- think your roleplaying style doesn't match with other players. 

 

What you are saying is "Oh you made a mistake and you are ruining your character and your player skills. What you've done is permanent. I will not consider you to fix anything because you already made a mistake in-character."

 

What's the point of RPing if there's no continuity or consequences for your actions?

What's the point of RPing with someone who will just troll and grief players because they make mistakes and take every words by hand by players small or big mistakes?

[Kage]

What's the point of RPing with someone who will just troll and grief players because they make mistakes and take every words by hand by players small or big mistakes?

What.

[Aya]

Okay, this is getting really silly :-X

[Warren Castille]

Something is very wrong when I am the middle ground between people fighting on the forums.

[Verranicus]

I just said, it is PLAYER's wish to whether they want to stick with it or change the plot completely if it discomforts them. Why bother pushing a player into keep or doing something that they are not okay with it? Just because -you- like it?

 

What Warren said is agreeable that you -can- make a decision whether you want to keep that plot memory in your character's background or just completely erase it from the boards because you feel that it is not helping you to progress further part of the plot because you wanted something bigger for the future with that Player B.

 

If someone stabbed my character by accident and he's in jail because of his mistake and then he PMs me that he wants to retcon because he made a mistake - I won't hold it against him and agree to cooperate. I retcon sometimes if I have to, and me retconning the whole Garlean story for my alt and etc has to be altered now since it is confirmed that Garleans who are pure blood have no abilities to use aether magic.

 

Let the cards collapse and make it into a newer deck and reshape the cards into a house again. Never said the house of cards had to remain as it stands.

 

You should be using these events, good or bad, to shape your character. You can't just erase what you don't like.

 

There are TIMES when a person needs to erase it when it's necessary. It's not your decision to say what they can do and what they cannot do. You aren't the developer of the game nor the game master of the game. You can freely ignore players or myself if -you- think your roleplaying style doesn't match with other players. 

 

What you are saying is "Oh you made a mistake and you are ruining your character and your player skills. What you've done is permanent. I will not consider you to fix anything because you already made a mistake in-character."

 

What's the point of RPing if there's no continuity or consequences for your actions?

What's the point of RPing with someone who will just troll and grief players because they make mistakes and take every words by hand by players small or big mistakes?

 

There's a difference between making a typo or jumping during an RP scene (player actions, feel free to pretend it never happened) and your character doing something you later regret (character actions). We play in a world with thousands of other people, and as such our RP will often affect people even if they're not directly involved in a scene. So, for you to just erase some RP because you as the player "changed your mind" is irresponsible and unfair to everybody else.

 

I'm not trolling or griefing, and I'm sorry if you got that impression.

[Gaspard]

my name is gaspard and this is jackass.

 

-slingshots himself face first at the thread-

[Random Encounter]

Some of you really need to step out and take a breather for a little bit. This thread an another are quickly turning into arguments that stating to edge toward personal attacks. Lets keep it civil shall we?

[Aldotsk]

I am sorry that I took it personally because I don't really like stereotyping things by people's cultures. Just because someone named their character Asian doesn't necessarily mean they are all bound to be one type of culture that everyone goes along with it.

 

That was one thing that got me worked out more than anything else and this argument started since that with multiple quotes I made on few pages ago.

 

*leaves the thread*

[Xydane Vale]

I admit, I had to do a bit of retconnin' for Xydane's and his brother's background.

 

Also, would it be consider retconning if you had to change the name of an important NPC character whom is related to your character's backstory because there is an actual NPC in-game with the same exact name? FML.